S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Up!: Tracks

Hey There True Believers!

It’s been a pretty busy week in general between the Super Bowl, Olympics, and the Lego Movie but I finally got a chance to sit down and watch the last episode of S.H.I.E.L.D. Before they take a brief hiatus and all I have to say is damnnnnnnnnnn… Seriously, I’ve said before that this show is somewhat of a slow burn and I’ll stick to that, but this weeks episode gave us quite a bit to move forward with, so on with the review!
Per usual, this’ll have some spoilers in it, so reader beware! This weeks show puts our team on a train across the Italian countryside to track down a package that the notorious Ian Quinn is purchasing from shady weapon-makers Cybertek. So the team breaks up into teams and gets on the train in undercover mode which gives us some funny sequences between Coulson and Simmons and Skye and Fitz (who reveals his American accent,) and an awesome cameo by none other than Stan himself!!!

The storytelling of this episode is not linear, and we get multiple flashbacks over a short period of time from different characters point of view, which feels many ways like a comic book. It seems that the Cybertek baddies have some kickass tech and when Ward and Coulson are forced to jump from the train they throw a grenade at them that makes the train disappear!?! Time travel? Asgardian portals? Not quite, but the episode really keeps you guessing. This leaves May, Skye, Fitz and Simmons on the train, but soon after we learn that the Cavalry has also been knocked off, so it becomes the bad guys vs. the high tech/low physical members of the team.

Coulson, Ward, and May get back together (after a double cross from the Italian Feds who tried and failed to torture May) and they find that the train just stopped in the middle of the Italian Countryside. We find that the Cybertek baddies went after the rest of the team, but they held their own and figured out what their weapon was too! The time travel/portal grenade that I mentioned earlier was really a toxin grenade that used the same ingredients of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Night Night gun. Simmons is taken out with the Night Night grenade so Fitz and Skye hide her in case any thugs come a knocking and they follow the Cybertek goons to a fancy pants villa where Ian Quinn is hanging out.

For some reason the non-agent and the non-field agent decide to grow a pair and send Skye in for Quinn while Fitz disables the getaway vehicles. Why anyone would not wait for backup completely boggles my mind, but the long of the short of it is like this: Skye goes in and finds something other than the Cybertek device in the basement of the villa, a hypobaric chamber containing Mike Peterson!!! Now the last we saw Mike he had fallen on rough times, the centipede-made super soldier lost a leg and was captured by the Clairvoyant and had one of the eye cams installed that we saw in Eye Spy. Quinn shows up and somewhat reveals to Skye his evil plan and let’s Mike out of the chamber. Skye tries talking to him but he ignores her as he’s now following the Clairvoyants orders. The Cybertek package was a cybernetic leg that Quinn grafts to Mike. Mike receives orders to head upstairs and clean up the loose ends and he decimates the entire Cybertek goon squad. Meanwhile Quinn and Skye exchange some banter back and forth while Coulson and company make their way on the scene. As we’ve seen in the past Skye tries to talk her way out of the sticky situation, but Quinn decides that he’s had enough and shoots her in the belly, then holds her in no sort of embrace and double taps her for good measure. The Clairvoyant gives Mike orders to not get into it with S.H.I.E.L.D. so he takes off.

The team finds Quinn full of blood and searches the compound for Skye. Coukson finds her and she’s dying in his arms. The team comes down and is distraught and with quick thinking Simmons tells them to throw her into the chamber to stableize her blood pressure. They take Quinn and Skye and get back aboard the bus as she needs medical attention stat! The entire team is grief stricken while their teammate lies in the chamber dying, and Ward is particularly upset. May tells him not to blame himself, and he says that he doesn’t, but he does blame someone while glaring at Coulson.

We next see Mike at a playground presumably watching his son, he writes a note asking if he could see his sin and a message comes across that says, not yet. The camera pans down to his leg that says Cybertek on it and the project name is “Deathlok!!!”

All in all, good episode with a nice cliffhanger. I didn’t see Skye getting shot to be honest, I thought that we might’ve lost Fitz. I’m sure that it’s not the end for her since she is a walking and talking 084, and it’s something that I’m surprised the Clairvoyant hasn’t picked up on yet. Well, that’s all I got this week. Tune in same S.H.I.E.L.D. time same S.H.I.E.L.D. channel next weeks for more S.H.I.E.L.D.S Up!

Reblogged this on THE EXTREMIS REVIEW and commented:
Here’s a great review of the recent Agents of SHIELD. Not only did we see Deathlok’s debut but we also were offered a wonderful cameo and Rashomon style narrative. Have a look of at review by the Brotherhood of Evil Geeks.